


a brief intermission

by bokutoma



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, References to Shakespeare, Rivalry, Rivals to Lovers, cymbeline
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-28
Updated: 2020-12-28
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:14:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,567
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28375239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bokutoma/pseuds/bokutoma
Summary: Hang there like a fruit, my soul, till the tree die!dorothea and ferdinand play lovers in esteemed director hanneman von essar's new play. the only problem is that they can't stand the sight of each other.
Relationships: Ferdinand von Aegir/Dorothea Arnault
Comments: 4
Kudos: 20
Collections: Sweet Like Honey





	a brief intermission

**Author's Note:**

> written for the fantastic zine sweet like honey!

_ “If thou wert honorable, thou wouldst have told this tale for virtue, not for such an end thou seek’st,-- as base as strange. Thou wrong’st a gentleman, who is as far from thy report as thou from honor, and solicit’st here a lady that disdains thee and the devil alike.” _

Hanneman von Essar, esteemed Mittelfrank director, gives Dorothea a riotous round of applause as she finishes her audition for the role of Imogen, and she is as light as air for the rest of the month. It takes her until the day before rehearsals are slated to begin to wonder who will be playing opposite her as Posthumus, but in her excitement, she brushes it off. Hanneman is renowned for his discerning eye, after all.

Foolish.

* * *

With today being not much more than a table reading and a way for the actors to begin to get a feel for their respective chemistry, Dorothea really has no need to get as dressed up as she is. Regardless,  _ Cymbeline _ is her first major production, and though she’s eternally grateful to Manuela for mentoring her and utilizing connections to land her parts, it feels  _ great  _ to have accomplished this all by herself. She knows Hanneman tangentially - more through reputation than real acquaintanceship - but if she wants to make a real impression and land on his rumored list of favorites, she’ll have to pull out all the stops. After all, Imogen isn’t exactly the biggest role, but it’s one she’s happy to play nonetheless, especially if it ends up as a stepping stone for greater things.

Still, by the time she’s fumbling with the keypad on the door and trying to prevent her skirt from blowing up in the unusually blustery autumn air, she’s wondering if maybe she overdid it a little.

“Having some trouble? I’d be more than happy to offer my assistance.”

She gets about halfway through devising a means of assault and escape before she’s even turned around, but the sight that greets her is not a leering stranger, as she’d expected, but rather Lorenz Gloucester, another one of Manuela’s students who’d graduated her program a year or so before her. “Lorenz! Great to see you, darling, and yes, you’d be such a treasure if you did.”

If he brings out the upper class theatre snob in her, so much the better for whoever waits for her inside.

He enters the code like he’s done this a million times before; for all she knows, he has. After all, the name Gloucester has recently become synonymous with stunningly poetic love interests and delightfully awful villains. There are only two roles he could be playing here, and though Dorothea herself isn’t exactly certain whether they have the chemistry to pull off a romance between them, she can’t say she wouldn’t be comforted by having a familiar face as Posthumus. 

Both of their heels click satisfyingly on the tiled ground as they navigate the storied halls of the opera house, and for once, she is content to let Lorenz take the lead as she imagines what it might have been like to roam these same luxurious halls a decade, a century, a millennium ago. 

These halls are as old as time and twice as lasting, and she prays to everything she holds dear that she will be able to leave her mark on them the way they have on her.

“Tell me,” she says, breaking the comfortable silence between them, and Lorenz looks back at her without missing a step, one thin eyebrow arched in question. “Are you playing Iachimo or Posthumus?”

“And are those the only roles you believe I could play?” But he’s teasing, and Dorothea knows through experience that despite his borderline awful first presentation, there’s no one with a tongue quite as sharp yet kind in turn as Lorenz, save, perhaps, herself.

“Just answer the question,” she says, rolling her eyes playfully.

“Iachimo, of course, and I suspect you play fair Imogen. You will, of course, let me know if I nauseate you too greatly in or out of performance, won’t you? Your comfort as the object of such boorish attentions comes first, naturally.”

He’s sweet to worry; no matter what, she sincerely doubts he could ever truly alarm her the way he believes he can. It is, after all, just acting, and she has seen many a man who has been worse.

“But then, who is playing Posthumus?” she asks.

Instead of answering, Lorenz leads them around the final corner, and a voice, stately and impassioned in equal measures, floats back to her, and her stomach turns.

_ “For there’s no motion that tends to vice in man but I affirm it is the woman’s part. Be it lying, note it, the woman’s; flattering, hers; deceiving, hers; lust and rank thoughts, hers, hers; revenges, hers; ambitions, covetings, change of prides, disdain, nice longings, slanders, mutability, all faults that man may name, nay, that hell knows, why, hers, in part or all, or rather all.” _

Son of a fucking  _ bitch. _

* * *

_ “This diamond was my mother’s: take it, heart; but keep it till you woo another wife, when Imogen is dead.” _

Even to her own ears, Dorothea’s declaration rings false. Here is where the virtuous Imogen is parted from her love for a length of time only the gods can guess at, and where she should be devastated, Dorothea’s voice falls flat. In truth, she finds herself relieved at the thought of parting from her Posthumus, but Hanneman has not cut them off yet as he had during their first rehearsal, so maybe she’s getting better at disguising it.

_ “How, how! Another? You gentle gods, give me-” _

“That’s enough.”

Every muscle in Dorothea’s body tenses at the words, posh and clipped-off syllables turning her blood to ice. Across from her, she sees the same reaction in Ferdinand von Aegir, and if she weren’t so frustrated and embarrassed, she would be celebrating the pure anguish she sees blooming in those hateful honey eyes. They both turn, practically synchronized even for all that they can’t seem to mesh while performing, to see Hanneman looking deeply unimpressed from where he sits in a plush armchair, pen uncapped but not in motion as he pores over his copy of the script.

“Honestly, with how highly Manuela praised the two of you, I hadn’t thought problems would be stemming from professionalism, of all things.”

Hanneman is not a cruel man, which makes the twist of his mouth into something worse than she ever could have believed.

“Forgive me,” Ferdinand says, about to launch into one of his pretentious, flowery speeches. The drama is meant for the stage, and she wonders if, with that diamond-cut jaw and princely figure, with the money that practically seems to pour off him in waves, he has ever truly needed to apologize for anything. “I-”

“Frankly, I don’t want to hear it. Neither of you are good enough to be acting like divas this early in your career.”

He’s right, but that doesn’t make the sting of this critique any better, especially when he had praised her so highly before.

“If neither of you can get over whatever this petty little feud is, I’ll be forced to let your understudies have your role. Goddess knows they’re both above this… this  _ squabbling.” _

Panic blooms in her ribcage; to be cast aside so soon would all but ensure she never truly got to work with Hanneman again. It can’t end like this, not with all she’s been through. Ferdinand looks the same, and something about that enrages her. After all, it’s not like he can’t make a “sizable contribution”. Like it or not, money buys many second chances.

“I have an idea, I suppose.” 

The voice is dry, nearly emotionless, and after all this time with feelings bubbling at her skin like liquid fire, her eyes are drawn to the source immediately. It’s Byleth, their stage manager, arms folded over their chest and hair in what could generously be called a bun. 

“ _ Please,”  _ Hanneman says, and to hear the man Manuela once described as a dried-up, unfeeling desert seem so fed up is a testament to her and Ferdinand’s dynamic, she supposes. Not that the thought of them  _ having  _ a dynamic does anything to improve her mood.

“Camping.”

“Are you joking?” Ferdinand asks, his face rife with shock, and even though she was thinking the same thing - might have been about to say it as well - his unwillingness to even hear them out irks her to no end.

But Hanneman apparently understands the message behind that single word, because a terrifyingly large grin stretches across his face. “Excellent idea! When can you leave?”

“Well, Dimitri and I were supposed to go this weekend-”

“That’s three days from now! Can you not push this forward? I’m sick to death of them.”

Byleth nods, and, trading a horrified look with Ferdinand, Dorothea knows her fate is sealed.

* * *

On an intellectual level, Dorothea has always known of the stretches of desert and dried-up grassland that dot Adrestia between major cities, but in all the years of her life, this is the first time she’s been unfortunate enough to bear witness to one. The drive up here had been miserable; Byleth’s self-proclaimed shitty sedan had had barely enough room for them, their boyfriend, Ferdinand, and Dorothea by the time their luggage had all been stored. Based on the single bag both Byleth and Dimitri had brought, Ferdinand and Dorothea had both supremely overpacked, and between being wedged against the door and having something in common with the devilspawn, she had  _ not  _ had a good time.

Still, after a night’s sleep, the beating heat of the sun is miserable, but no worse than it had been in the car with no air conditioning reaching the back, and she has enough clothes to change twice a day if need be, so the only thing she’s losing her mind over is the performance back home.

Outside, Byleth has laid out a meager breakfast of protein bars, and they recline against their boyfriend, shirt already soaked through with sweat as Dorothea and Ferdinand emerge from their tents at the same time. Ferdinand can’t seem to stop himself from making a face, and before she can check herself, Dorothea finds herself snorting out a laugh. The heat has already gotten to his fair skin, because when his head snaps up in surprise, he’s bright red.

“Sunscreen?” Byleth asks, breaking whatever fragile moment there had been and waving a tube. “We’re hiking.”

“Uh, do we have to?” She tries on her brightest smile. “I’m sure Ferdinand and I can find something else to do.”

Byleth gives the most unimpressed look that she has ever been on the receiving end of, and she acquiesces, but not before vowing to not speak to Ferdinand if she can help it. She just has to get through this and remember this feeling, and she can act her damn heart out, no matter if her stage lover can or not.

Two hours later, and she realizes she’s trailing after a couple of damn mutants; despite the blazing heat and the sweat that soaks them all through, Byleth and Dimitri show no signs of turning around back to camp, so they have no choice either.

“What the  _ fuck, _ ” Ferdinand mutters beside her, his normally unfairly beautiful hair lank and damp. It’s the first time he’s ever said anything even approaching rudeness in front of her, and the combination of the sun and the absurdity of the whole situation causes her to dissolve into giggles, hiccuping as she desperately sucks in air.

“What the fuck,” she agrees, and Ferdinand shoots her a brief, confused smile, one that she’s too tired to dissect for the contempt she knows must be lying under there somewhere. Even so, he looks pleased, and it’s a good look on him, to have it be there because of her and not because of whatever rich asshole thing he’s thinking about at the moment.

Perhaps this interaction, however brief, is exactly what Byleth had been waiting for, because it’s only another five minutes along whatever trail they have mapped in their mind before they’re turning around, back to the blessed solace of camp.

“I might have died out here if we had gone any further,” she says, and finds herself surprised to note that it’s not Byleth she’s talking to.

Ferdinand grins all the way back to camp, and for once, Dorothea doesn’t want to do whatever it takes to erase it.

There is another two days of this in which Ferdinand pulls faces that make him look stupid and Dorothea laughs harder than she has in months before they reach their final night, and they have no choice but to confront their return to Enbarr and the Mittelfrank. When they turn in for the night, Byleth catches her eye and jerks their chin in Ferdinand’s direction, and, like it or not, she knows what she has to do.

“Can I speak with you?” she asks, and, though he looks confused, Ferdinand acquiesces.

The air is desert-cold even in her tent, but when they sit, her knee bumps against his, and the point of contact feels like fire.

“We should talk.”

It’s a repetition of what she said before, but Ferdinand simply takes it in stride, seeming to mull it over in his head for a long moment before he speaks. “Alright, then. I’ll begin with a question. Why do you dislike me?”

It’s a simple enough question, really, but all she can do is gape at him like he’s gone insane. “Why do  _ I  _ dislike  _ you _ ?”

“Yes. Maybe I’m just as foolish as you say, but I don’t understand it.”

She could lie here, make something up and never reveal an insecurity he could so easily exploit, but this is the man who had laughed at her jokes, even the ones that weren’t funny, and a part of her that has never once faltered softens at the earnest look in his eyes.

“I don’t like you because everything comes easily to you.” He recoils as though stricken, but there is no time to spare his feelings if she wants to get this out. “Do you know how long I had to save to get my first lesson from Manuela? The jobs I had to work? I’ve been employed by someone or another since I was twelve, and it was only when I turned seventeen that I had enough for my first few lessons. I’ve only had a good night’s rest in the past couple years, but then  _ you  _ waltz in with clothes worth more than my annual salary and just decide that you want to sing! What did it cost you? Nothing. I’m sure her fees were pocket change to you. Everything was easy, and you looked down on everyone for whom it wasn’t, regardless of whether you meant to or not.”

“Is that what you think?” he asks, and it’s unfair how pretty he looks when affecting persecution.

“It is. It was.” She offers a smile she knows is wan in return. “Your turn.”

“I’ve never hated you. I think it’s impossible.”

And every inch of her wants to rage against this, wants to call him out on every snide comment and sidelong look, but three days of uninterrupted time with someone will show you what they’re really like, and Ferdinand is not a bad man, just one that is wholly unaware of how unapproachable and pretentious he seems. “I see.”

“Do you?” A week ago, she would have bitten back at a question that seemed nothing but condescending, but his eyes are wide, filled with a desperation for understanding she knows all too well. “You know of my father’s law practice.”

The wealthy firm of von Vestra and von Aegir, one that caters to the rich and the guilty. It is a name she knows all too well, one that raises her hackles immediately. “I’m not wholly ignorant.”

“Ignorant is the last word I would ever use to describe you.” His smile is barely there, a mere flicker of his usual radiance. “I hate it. Everything about it. We are more similar than you might think, than I might have led you to believe.”

“Oh?” 

“I was supposed to follow in his footsteps, though I suppose that would not surprise you overly. To make a mockery of the law like that, though… It was not something I could bear to do, but neither could I tell my father of my decision. Maybe this makes me a coward, but I saved the money he gave me to spend on wine, women, and connections to fund my dream of the arts, one I harbored ever since I was young and saw Manuela gracing the stage in the role of Ophelia. Since he learned of my decision, I have been cut off; I am a von Aegir in name only now.”

“Ferdinand-”

“You are not unjustified in your assessment of me, though. I have been vapid, condescending, and even ignorant. I have not blamed you for your irritation with me, and I would not dream of starting now. I am far more like my father than I have ever wished to be.”

There are words Dorothea could gift him as a counterpoint, ways that she could convince him that since the start of this trip, she has seen something far better in him than his hateful father could ever hope for. Words, however, are not her strength, not when they have to be dug up from the vulnerable core of her.

Instead, she leans forward and presses her lips to his, raw in a way that would be unforgiving if she did not feel the swell of fondness that surged through her like a tidal wave. There are no fireworks, no catch in her chest that sets tinder alight, and yet it is everything she has ever wanted in a kiss, one that is tender with no expectation of anything further than this moment.

When he cups her face in one finely-structured hand, his gentle nature feels like hope.

The drive home is fraught with a different kind of tension, one that is far too knowing for Dorothea’s liking. Byleth shoots them glances from the passenger seat, and though she knows they can’t see where her hand rests under Ferdinand’s, she has a feeling that there’s no hiding from them anyway. Ferdinand seems oblivious to it, as is his way, but when he leans over to whisper a joke about the state of Dimitri’s hair, she outright giggles, a move so uncharacteristic of her that Byleth, despite their apparently limited grasp of social cues, averts their eyes with a small smile.

There is a part of her that still loathes to show him that he’s the one making her happy; a conversation can’t change  _ everything,  _ no matter how much it seems to. Still, she squeezes his hand when he begins to look melancholy - something all actors are wont to do at some point or another - and the contact seems to startle a delightfully unbridled happiness from him, one that makes her terribly glad that life has conspired to allow them to meet.

A third kind of tension runs as taut as a wire through the halls of the Mittelfrank the day after they return to Enbarr, and though she knows it is unfounded, she finds herself comforted by the fact that the walls themselves, luxuriously draped and adorned with portraits of fading stars, do not care, at least. Last time they were here, the whole cast and crew of  _ Cymbeline  _ had seen her and Ferdinand at somewhere bordering their worst, and she would be wary of letting them near all their hard work if she were among them, too.

Byleth is not smiling, but that’s only because they never do, and when Hanneman sees their approach, he seems to relax at his stage manager’s entirely unbothered countenance.

“A success?” he asks, but Byleth doesn’t even need to nod before he’s spotted their intertwined hands. He groans, long and loud and entirely too dramatic for a man who prides himself on being above his theatrical charges, but amusement tugs at the corners of his mouth, and the tentative look of excitement in Ferdinand’s eyes when he steals a look at her matches her own. “Goddess, I should have known it would be something like this. You lot are nothing if not predictable.”

The only thing that keeps her from making a snide comment about similar bickering between him and Manuela is her  _ very  _ recent departure from thin ice.

All told, though, she and Ferdinand have their roles back, and though the rest of the cast and crew still shoots them sidelong looks, as though wondering when the witchcraft Byleth must have utilized will wear off, Dorothea knows that, with time, they will earn their trust back.

After all, they make a stellar pair.

* * *

_ “Why did you throw your wedded lady from you? Think that you are upon a rock; and now throw me again.” _

Onstage, backlit and brilliant, the reunited lovers embrace, tears shining in both of their eyes.

_ “Hang there like a fruit, my soul, till the tree die!” _

And when they kiss, they are not acting, and no eye in the house remains dry.

**Author's Note:**

> twitter: @kingblaiddyd


End file.
